The Demon Wizard of Fleet Street
by CrayonQueen18
Summary: Sent to Azkaban on a false charge, after fifteen years, Bill Weasley is back, bringing with him a hunger for revenge that must be satisfied. A/U/Dark fic. Rated T for now, rating subject to change.
1. The Taste of Freedom

_**A/N: **__Here we go! An epic tale of murder, revenge, love, and food! This was an ambitious project that made me slightly afraid of my own imagination. I feel kind of bad for stealing JKR's characters, Stephen Sondheim's lyrics, and the urban legend and mixing them into a big bowl of… I don't even know. It's up to you to taste it and decide what it is. But there you go. I've never written anything like this. I just hope that I don't lose my credibility ;). _

_If you don't understand it, that's probably because you've never heard of, or seen the musical/urban legend_

_Anyways, I own nothing, except a few added or changed words here and there to make the lyrics fit with HP-verse. But even still, I don't claim to have invented the English language, so I don't think I even own those! _

_And though the title, says 'Fleet Street', it doesn't necessarily take place there. I just need a place to put in the title that didn't sound bad and gave readers the idea of what it was based off of._

_The italicized words are "sung", or rather the lines of the songs themselves._

_This story is dedicated to my best friend Noelle who listened, my sister who nurtured, artists worldwide who never give up, and my beautiful classmates who will never stop believin'._

Bill's tongue was stinging against the harsh salt of the ocean water. It was bitter, dirty and cold, but completely welcome as it rushed rapidly into his open mouth, relishing every sight and sound he could take in. He plunged deeper into the water, diving beneath the waves to avoid any eyes that might be scanning the shores on night shift. He plunged deeper and deeper into the water, the moonlight above a small coin of light above him as he swam further and further away from Azkaban and from an uncomfortable sanity.

He hadn't remembered falling, nor had he remember escaping, but how he did so didn't matter now. It was the why that kept him afloat as his lips met the surface and air returned to his lungs. The night air clung to his face, a welcoming embrace into the world. It was a rebirth into the world as a new man, a different man than he had left as; different in ways he didn't know yet.

The wind was whipping wildly that night… or was it morning? There was no telling. The only clear things at the moment were the water and wind and how it flowed over him. Each wave called him closer to a large moving object. _Fleur _the waves said, reminding him (though he hardly needed it) why he had escaped in the first place. The simple syllable kept him afloat. _Fleur… Fleur… Fleur… _The object grew nearer and nearer. _Fleur… _He wondered where she was now. Had she remarried? No, not Fleur. Was she still alive, even? Bill kept his head above water optimistically. And what of their daughter, Victorie, never knowing her father? She would be about sixteen now, wouldn't she? _Fleur… Fleur… Sir! Sir!_ Bill found it hard to tread water now. The object was a ship. A ship! And they were calling out to him! Fleur had kept him floating long enough to be spotted. "Thank you, love," he said as the ship grew larger and larger. It was close enough to touch now. Just a little ways more and he would be free. _Bountiful… _What a name. Bill certainly hoped it was.

Somehow, lost in thoughts and at sea, he was on board.

"Good thing we found you, sir!" A young voice said. "These are treacherous waters, these are. Another hour out there and you might be dead."

Bill didn't respond. He stared out at the prison island, evanescent in the dark cloak of night. Yes. Freedom. There was no other word for it. He turned to the man who offered him a warm towel, which he took graciously.

"Teddy." He said.

"Excuse me?"

"Teddy's the name, sir!"

"Bill," he responded. "And thank you."

"What were you doing out there?"

Prisoner was not a word with good connotation, even if it was a false charge, so Bill turned away. "Don't ask questions, boy. The answers, I assure you, will never be the ones you want."

"Then I won't ask questions, sir."

The _Bountiful _sailed dutifully on through the darkness. Bill glanced eagerly over the edge. He didn't know where they were going. But he didn't care. Once he was far away from the prison, he'd fashion a new life, find his wife and daughter, and happily they would live, far away from everyone. By the sea, perhaps.

The presence of another stirred Bill from his thoughts. "Do you smell that?"

"Smell what?" Bill asked, expressionless against the wind.

"There's nothing like it, Mr. Bill. Nothing like London."

"No. There isn't."

London. That was where they were going? He was to return to his past, his haunting past, filled to the brim with ghostly faces that filled him with grief?

The blue-haired young man, Teddy, gave a large sigh, as if he had just fallen in love. "_I have sailed the world beheld its wonders from the Dardanelles, to the mountains of Peru, but there's no place like London! I feel home again...I could hear the city bells ring...Whatever would I do?"_

Bill had to cough to cover up a laugh. This young man thought he was learned. Geography was perhaps his strong point, but Geography was only the tip of the iceberg.

"_No there's no place like London." _The disgust in his voice couldn't be denied as the ship sailed to a stop into a port.

"Mr. Bill?"

He didn't expect Teddy to understand in his naivety and age. _"You are young. Life has been kind to you. You will learn." _Just as his disgust in this memorable city was evident, as was Teddy's confusion. "This is where we part, Teddy. I will never forget the _Bountiful _or the young man who saved my life. Thank you, Teddy."

The blue-haired boy laughed. "No need thank me, Mr. Bill. What kind of respectable man would I be if when I spotted you, didn't sound an alarm?"

"I can assure you, Teddy, there are several well respected men who wouldn't have done what you did."

Teddy opened his mouth to speak, but his words fell silent as another voice took over. It was a female voice, throaty and heavily laced in accent. "_Alms, alms for a miserable woman, on a miserable chilly morning?" _Teddy fished through his pockets and placed some-odd left over knuts into the begging woman's hand, dirtied with the day's tasks, and trembling in the cold of the fall wind.

Timidly, the woman thanked him, and then turned to Bill, repeating the same request. Bill turned his back. His pockets were vacant anyways. Bill had been poor before, but never destitute. Destitute was sad, poor was hopeful. Bill fell into neither category. He was now nameless. He might as well not of existed. "I have nothing," he insisted, expressionless, and she listened, turning back her source of income, Teddy.

"_How would you like a little muff, dear a little jig-jig, a little bounce around the bush? Wouldn't you like to push my parsley? It looks to me, dear, that you've got plenty there to push!" _As the woman's hand reached, Bill smacked it away from Teddy… smacked. Bill was shocked with himself. What had happened to him? Fifteen years sweating in a prison cell had changed him. He missed his old self, his old life, his wife, his daughter. He stared at his pale hand. How it had changed. How incomplete and naked it felt. No wedding ring… no wand.

Hurt, with glossy eyes the begging woman looked up at Bill, ready to exclaim her apologies, but instead, she touched his face. "_Don't I know you, mister?" _

Bill peeled her hand from his face like it were a band-aid that irritated his skin. "Must you glare at me woman?" He couldn't be seen here, couldn't be recognized. "Go away. Just leave us, please." The please tasted foreign on his tongue. Unlike the salty water, though, it tasted sour, but still there was a taste of familiarity on it. He had said it many times before, but that was years ago. There was no 'please' in prison, no mercy, no manners, no decency toward fellow man. Prison followed none of the rules he had once lived by, and adapting was the only way to survive.

He tried not to watch with pity as the woman walked away, chanting her plea for alms, charity, a scintilla of kindness.

He turned to find Teddy, mulling over what had just happened. "Sir, before we part…"

"Yes, what is it?"

"I know I promised never to question you, and I think I've followed through on that. For whatever reason you were out there in the ocean is your affair, and yet, over the past couple of weeks we've been sailing together on The _Bountiful_, I've began thinking of you as a friend. So if you ever need any help… or money…"

"No," was Bill's immediate answer. He wasn't a charity case. Bill allowed Teddy to help him immensely once before, and to do so again would be a disservice to them both. "But thank you." The word was buried beneath the filthy prison stone floor, covered in the slime and muck of abandonment and hate.

"Sorry to question you, but why, sir?"

"_There's a hole in the world like a great black pit and the vermin of the world inhabit it, and its morals aren't worth what a pig could spit, and it goes by the name of London. At the top of the hole sit the privileged few making mock of the vermin in the lower zoo, turning beauty to filth and greed... I too have sailed the world and seen its wonders, for the cruelty of men is as wondrous as Peru but there's no place like London!" _Bill glanced around at his new surroundings. "There are ghosts and shadows everywhere, Teddy. I'd be careful not to upset them."

"Ghosts?"

Of course the boy would ask. He was a curious lad. Bill was no longer in the dank, dark shadows of modern-day London. The sun was shining brightly as the birds chirped happily around a market place. Memories sprang into colour and life, and painted the pictures of happy days long ago, but not forgotten. A curse breaker and his young family walked carelessly through London. "T_here was a breaker and his wife and she was beautiful... a foolish breaker and his wife. She was his reason for his life...and she was beautiful, and she was virtuous. And he was naive."_

"Naïve, sir?"

"Not unlike yourself, Teddy. _There was another man who saw that she was beautiful...A pious vulture of the law who, with a gesture of his claw removed that wizard from his plate! And there was nothing but to wait! And she would fall! So soft! So young! So lost and oh so beautiful!"_ Bill felt like crying, his face twisted into a pained grimace. His wife, his beautiful wife fell away from his loving, protective arms, his family defenseless as he saw them fade away. The stinging on his head from the auror's stunning hex had knocked him almost senseless. The innocent were always the first to fall. Why was it the innocent were always the first to fall?

"The lady, sir, the wife… what happened to her?"

"_Oh that was many years ago. I doubt if anyone would know." _The memories that swirled fantastically around him faded into the more modern, but gloomy structures that remained. "Now, Teddy, you must leave me. There's someplace I have to go. Something… Something I have find out."

"But won't I see you before I leave for Plymouth?"

"You may come find me if you'd like, Teddy. I won't wander."

Bill's dragon-hide boots clicked in time to the dripping water off the damp window sills around him as they hit the paved streets of London. "_There's a hole in the world like a great black pit and it's filled with people who are filled with shit and the vermin of the world inhabit it." _


	2. The Shop Below

Home. The word was beautifully resonating through his mind. He needed to get home, see his wife, and meet with his daughter. He needed to hold them to him and kiss their angelic faces until his lips became chapped .He needed to be back in that small flat, needed to smell the air within it. He remembered it vaguely and how it smelled of gardenias. Home… What a wonderful word.

He knew these streets well, a permanent map was drawn in his mind's eye and it provoked his muscle memory. Even in the changes in them that had been instilled throughout the years, a ghost of a trace of the way it once was still led the way. A left here, hook a right there, around the tailor's… There it was. Old, decrepit. The ghost of its former glory loomed over it, a grey cloud, heavy with memories.

Below his house, his neighbor. Years ago, he had spoken to the couple that lived down thee, had them over for dinner. But now, they, like the rest of London, was lost to the filthy, greedy streets of today.

_Mrs. Lovegood's Meat Pie Emporium. _Yes, now he began to remember. Remember, and embrace. The streets near here were vacant, the way mosquitoes were repelled by spray, people walked away from the street as quickly as they could.

But not Bill. He opened the emporium door as casually as he would've fifteen years ago.

There, a woman stood, glowing pale in the dimly lit room, the loud clanging of cutlery and popping of a fire the only noises in the room.

Feverishly working, she didn't acknowledge Bill until a small cough was uttered by him and she was yanked abruptly from her concentration.

"A customer!"

Bill, startled by her sudden excitement, and not wanting to intrude, turned to leave.

"Wait!" she called, _"What's your rush? What's your hurry? You gave me such a-"_ she wiped her hands on her apron, _"fright! I thought you was a ghost. Half a minute, can't you sit?"_ But Bill's legs were like petrified wood. _"Sit you down! Sit!"_ But there wasn't much sitting to be done, considering Mrs. Lovegood; the pale woman more or less pushed Bill into the nearest seat before he had time to react. _"All I meant is that I haven't seen a customer for weeks. Did you come here for a pie, sir?"_ At this, she picked a pie up and placed it excitedly onto the cleanest plate she could find. _"Do forgive me if my head's a little vague."_ She reached up to brush her white blonde hair behind her ear, procuring a bug from her white locks. "What was that?" She examined it for no more than a moment before placing it down on the counter. _"But you'd think we had the plague from the way that people--"_ The bug scurried away, hoping to go unnoticed, but a small, white hand chased after it_, "keep avoiding--_No, you don't!—_Heaven knows I try, sir. But there's no one comes in even to inhale._" At last, she found a pie that was bug free (for the most part), placed it on a plate, and placed it in front of Bill. _"Right you are, sir. Would you like a drop of ale?"_ Bill nodded, for the woman was rather hospitable. Quickly, she skimmed over the small bump in the conversation and continued on (she could really talk). "_Mind you, I can hardly blame them_." She had his attention while she poured a tankard of ale. _"These are probably the worst pies in London I know why nobody cares to take them. I should know, I make them. But good? _No. _The worst pies in London-- even that's polite. The worst pies in London. If you doubt it, take a bite..._" Bill didn't very much care. Pie was pie, and anything was better than the gruel and pig shit they fed you in prison. So he obliged, sinking his teeth deep into the pie, prepared to enjoy his first good meal in one and a half decades. And he regretted it. Was it his imagination, or did he taste dust as something foul crawled over his tongue? The doughy center left traces of the mildewy counter in his mouth. His teeth collided with something rubbery that flipped around like a fish out of water.  
When Mrs. Lovegood's back was turned, the food in his mouth was on the floor, blending in seamlessly with brownish flooring. But she noticed nonetheless, somehow knowing he'd do just that. "_Is that just disgusting, you have to concede it. It's nothing but crusting_," She returned with his ale, much to Bill's delight, "_Here, drink this, you'll need it. The worst pies in London..._" And off she was, to prepare another, hopefully better pie. "_And no wonder with the price of meat what it is, when you get it. Never thought I'd live to see the day… men would think it was a treat finding poor animals that are dying in the street. Mrs. Moony has a pie shop._"  
"Who's Mrs. Moony?"  
"Who's Mrs. Moony?" Lovegood repeated back, her voice surprisingly whimsical, "She's my competition. Mrs. Nymphadora Lupin. Calls herself 'Mrs. Moony', she does. _She does her business but I noticed something weird. Lately all the neighbors' cats have disappeared. I have to hand it to her, what I call is enterprise, popping pussies into pies. It wouldn't do in my shop._" Bill found himself slightly relieved at this news, and yet, slightly sick to his stomach. He couldn't tell if that was from the pie he just attempted to ingest, or if it was from the newfound knowledge that Tonks was cooking cats. "_Just the thought of it's enough to make you sick. And I'm telling you those pussy cats are quick._" Bill chocked on his ale as he tried not to laugh at the hypocritical irony of this. "_No denying times are hard, sir. Even harder than the worst pies in London!_" Bill tried, grudgingly to take another bite. "_Only lard and nothing more. Is that just revolting? All greasy and gritty. It looks like it's molting, and tastes like--_" 'All shitty' was Bill's only thought, but Mrs. Lovegood chimed in again. "_Well, pity! A woman alone; with limited wind and the worst pies in London._" She sighed, miserable at the bleak picture she must have been painting. "_Ah, sir. Times are hard…_" Bill, though, was no longer listening. He was gulping down his ale in hopes to wash out the horrendous taste of the pie.  
"Trust me, sir. It's going to take a lot more than ale to wash that taste out. If you come with me, I'll get you a nice tumbler of gin." At this, Bill noticed the surprised look on her face wasn't just from the shock of having her first customer in who-knows-when; it was just how her faced looked. Interesting.  
Bill rose to his feet and followed her behind black curtains to a second part of the building; a second part that might as well have been a second whole world. A harpsichord sat in a corner, collecting dust, but still was beautiful, as were the odd little knick-knacks that stood along the shelves lining the walls. "Isn't this just homey?" She started, "The wallpaper was such a bargain to, since it was only partly singed when the chapel burned down. Here you are," she handed him a large amount of gin, which was perfect to wash out the sickening taste that had reached a cruel fortissimo within his mouth. "Now, have a seat by the fire. You look chilled to the bone."  
Bill did as he was told, the taste surrendering to the stronger one of the gin. "There's a room above this shop, isn't there?" he tried to sound casual. "If times are so hard, why don't you rent it out to someone?"  
"That? Up there? Merlin's beard no! I won't go near it."  
"Why's that?"  
"People say it's haunted."  
"Haunted?" That was absurd. Bill had lived up there once upon a time. Haunted? In all that rooms cheeriness? It was impossible.  
"Yes, haunted. And who's to say they're wrong? Something nasty happened up there. Years ago."  
"What happened?"  
"_There was a wizard and his wife, and he was beautiful. A handsome breaker and his wife, but they transported him for life."_ She gave a sad sort of sigh, the smell of nostalgia filling the air. "_And he was beautiful_."  
"What was his name?" Bill asked, already knowing the answer, but not wanting to hear it said aloud.  
"Weasley. William Weasley."  
"And his crime?"  
Another sigh. "Foolishness."  
They sat in a silence that tried to strangle him while Lovegood went unharmed. She merely stared intensely at him while the fire glowed bright and red, reflecting across her sheet white face. "_He had this wife you see, pretty little thing, silly little nit, had her chance for the moon on a string-- Poor thing. Poor thing._"  
Bill could see it now; Fleur, up in that room, beautiful, distraught, tears glowing silver on her angelic face. A baby was pressed tightly to her, crying, as she tried to hum her back to sleep.

"_There was this man you see, wanted her like mad. Everyday he sent her a flower. But did she come down from her tower? Sat up there and sobbed by the hour. Poor fool… Ah, but there was worse yet to come, poor thing."_

Worse? How could this story, his story, his wife's story get any worse than this? He had been sent to Azkaban on a false charge, his wife was by herself, forced to raise their daughter alone for fifteen years. How could his life, her life get any worse?

The war. Who had won the war? Bill couldn't remember the details. Just lights, and curses, and dead bodies of friend's and his brother strewn across the floor, the last ghost of a trace of their last expression permanently plastered on their faces. The dark side, Lord Voldemort's side had won. The Order had lost, but they scrambled to regain their lives, to regain order and some grasp of sanity.

"_Well, Wormtail calls on her all polite, poor thing… poor thing." _Luna shook her head sadly, "_Malfoy he tells her is all contrite. He blames himself for her dreadful plight. She must come straight to his house tonight, poor thing… poor thing..."_

It was all coming back to Bill now. That man had been Lucius Malfoy, member of the "new and improved" Wizenmagot. He was a persuasive figure in society now with Voldemort in power, human once more. Sending Bill to Azkaban had been as easy as picking lint off a sweater; one swift move and he out of the picture. That made Malfoy free to take his wife. It was a giant, violent game of chess. Bill had been check mated.

"_Of course when she goes there poor dear, poor thing, they're having a ball all in masks. There's no one she knows there poor dear, poor thing. She wanders, tormented, and drinks, poor thing. Malfoy has repented she thinks poor thing. 'Oh where is Sir Malfoy?' she asks. He was there all right, only not so contrite." _

So Wormtail was in on this, too? That bastard! Bill felt unexplainable feelings erupt within him, boiling from somewhere deep. He was about to explode. Lucius Malfoy and Wormtail were going to pay. But how would he do that?

"_She wasn't no match for such craft, you see. And everyone thought it so droll. They figured she had to be daft, you see, so all of them stood there and laughed, you see. Poor soul… poor thing!" _Luna had finished her story, not saying enough, but saying more than was necessary, saying everything he needed to hear.

At that moment, so many things happened at once. He saw every occurrence of the past happen at once. He saw Malfoy's large hot hand encircle Fleur's thigh, Bill's beautiful, pure, virtuous Fleur… Not her. He saw her cry in pain and fear as Lucius held back her flailing arms as she angrily scratched at him, trying to get him off her. His lustful lips searched her body as his party guests watched, laughing hysterically with cruel, sick tones.

As she screamed, a tea kettle hissed and Victorie, snuggled in her crib began to cry…

It was tearing at Bill, bitterly, ripping his inner mind apart as his heart began to shatter. Was he going insane?

"No!" He cried, rising to his feet, his face pulled into a pained, shocked, and heartbroken grimace. "Would no one have mercy on her?" If she said no, he would die, whether that was emotionally or physically, he didn't know.

Luna Lovegood's face was unrecognizable. It was pulled into a please, elated smile that hid behind a shocked and serious face. "So it is you… Bill Weasley?"

He didn't answer. He merely stared at nothing. Or perhaps he was staring at the memories that were spinning away, replaced by vicious, blind hatred for the men that brought this to life, that made his world fall down around his ears. "Where's Fleur?" he asked, feeling light headed, the moment surrounding him, surreal, "Where's my wife?"

Luna sat, silent for a moment, chewing her words before spitting them coldly with as much gentleness as she could in his face. "She poisoned herself. Draught of the Living Death from the apothecary in Diagon Alley." She looked down at her hands. "I tried to stop her, really I did. But why would she listen to _me_?"

Bill felt the world crash around his feet, his heart shatter violently within his chest. His wife, dead? In a surreal spiral, Bill felt himself fall. He didn't know where he was going, or whether or not he was sitting or standing. He was unaware of which was up or down. As the tears, for the first time in years fell silently down his pallor cheeks. Where was his daughter? Where was his baby girl?

Mrs. Lovegood seemed to read the question off his face as if he were a book, vulnerable and exposed. "He has your daughter. He adopted her like his own."

"He?" Bill asked. His blood didn't run cold anymore. In fact, it stopped running for a moment, and then began to boil on high. "Malfoy?"

At this exact moment, Bill indescribable grief morphed into an equal amount of anger. Malfoy was the reason behind his imprisonment. He was the reason why his family slipped through his hands the way sand slipped quickly through an hour glass. He was the reason his wife had poisoned herself and now lay beneath his feet, enveloped soft, eternal sheets of soil, her perfect, beautiful body the meal of the crawling creatures she always detested. Malfoy was the reason his daughter grew up away from loving arms and was thrust into the cruel world of corruption that was sure to twist her fragile, wonderful mind.

Bill's knees lost their ability to hold him up, but he remained standing. "Fifteen years." He said with a voice barely audible over the crackles and pops of the fire behind them and the usual creaking of old buildings. "Fifteen years, I've wasted away in an Azkaban cell. I spent fifteen years dreaming that I might come home to a wife and child."

"I must say," Lovegood piped up, boldly, "the years haven't been too kind to you, Mr. Weasley."

The sadness on Bill's face twisted into a smile. "No. They haven't. And I will be compensated for those years."

"Compensated?" Lovegood gasped, her hands flying to her pale pink lips. "You don't mean…" She couldn't utter the word.

But Bill's smile grew wider still. "Revenge." He said, the image of Fleur's death being avenged fleeting almost joyfully before his eyes. "Revenge." The word began to taste good on his tongue. "It will be mine." He stood, his silence chilling the air. Not even the fire provided heat now. "Wormtail and Malfoy will pay for what they did."

Lovegood only stared, her face unreadable. "What are you going to do?"

Bill smiled slowly. "First," he said, "I'll need to see that room."


	3. Victorie

Teddy walked through the gossamer curtain of rain, the droplets blurring his vision as he peered, helpless at his map which grew heavy and wet with precipitation. This road was familiar. Too familiar. He had to of passed it at least three times before. Making cirlces and figure-eights in the flagstones hadn't been the plan and finding Hyde Park was becoming far harder than originally thought.

Teddy sat and ran a hand through his wet cobalt locks agitatedly as frustration roared like the storm in his ears. But over the sound, he heard a soft coo, like a dove floating overhead. He looked up, pulling back the veil of blue that obstructed his vision to see the source of this heavenly sound. And there, in a tower of brick and mortar, sat a girl, hauntingly sad, her porcelain skin streaked with tears like the rain outside. The window framed her like a pop-up book as she looked without seeing at the bustling world below her, kept hidden in plain sight from her, tantalizingly close. She lightly fingered the lacey veil that hung around the thick panes like cobwebs.

Teddy stood, drawn by the sound and approached the grey building that glittered in the rain. He walked to it until he was stopped by a wrought-iron fence, a cruel blockade from his fair angel. Her lips were moving, and from his position below, he could hear her words, a ghost of a whisper carried in the droplets of rain.

"_Green finch and linnet bird, nightingale, blackbird, how is it you sing? How can you jubilate, sitting in cages, never taking wing?"_ With each word she sang, she seemed to get sadder. And with each word she sang, Teddy felt his heart get heavier. "_Outside the sky waits, beckoning, beckoning, just beyond the bars. How can you remain staring at the rain, maddened by the stars?" How is it you sing anything? How is it you sing?"_ Teddy watched her intently now, his heart feeling as if it were about to burst inside him.

_How is it _you _sing? _He asked himself, watching her and wondering what it was that could make her hurt so badly, but sing and yearn so beautifully. Her blue eyes met his brown ones and they watched each other for a long moment, but her grief didn't lessen, it didn't waver. Her anguish continued on, a straight, fluid ray of light that pierced him to the core. "_My cage has many rooms, damask and dark. Nothing there sings, not even my lark. Larks never will, you know, when they're captive. Teach me to be more adaptive. Green finch and linnet bird, nightingale, blackbird, teach me how to sing. If I cannot fly, let me sing."_

Once more they looked at each other, the translucent trace of a smile flickering on her face, but in an instant it was gone as she stood frantically to turn around. And with that, she disappeared into the darkness of her room, leaving behind the words she sang, the saddened air that surrounded her, and a feeling that was growing rapidly within Teddy.

Teddy stared up at her window, captivated by the elusive sad woman. But his happy reverie was disturbed when there was a tap on his shoulder. Jumping, Teddy turned to see a tendril of a woman crouching toward him. "_Alms! Alms!" _she said, "_Alms for a miserable woman! On a miserable chilly morning…" _Teddy dropped some coins into her palm. A few sickles and a bronze knut. She needed it more than he did, anyway. As the filthy, shivering woman began to scurry away, Teddy stopped her. "Excuse me, ma'am," he said, gently grabbing her wrist and turning her towards him. "Could you tell me who it is that resides here?"

The woman gasped slowly in amazement. "Who resides 'ere?" the woman asked back, a mad laugh on her tongue. "That's the great Malfoy's manor, that is. He's the Minister now. 'As been for the past thirteen years now, you know."

"And the girl?" Teddy asked, now arriving at the subject he had longed to reach.

"That's Victorie, 'is beautiful little ward. 'E keeps her all snug and locked up in there all day and night. So don't go trespassing there, or it'll be the Cruciatus Curse for you, or rather, any young man with no good on 'is mind."

Suddenly, at those words, she stepped closer to him, her ragged, filthy clothing rubbing his pristine uniform. "Speaking of which," she said, he voice low and seductive, her breathing shallow, "_'Ow would you like a little muff, dear, a little jig jig, a little bounce around the bush? Wouldn't you like to push my parsley? It looks to me, dear, like you got plenty there to push_." And her hand, appearing from inside her tattered rags emanated a silver glow as it dove for Teddy's groin. Teddy stared at her hand, entranced by the beautiful beam of light. He almost moved back, ready to fish into his pocket to provide her with more coins. But the woman's eyes, only a shadow of them visible beneath her cloaked head, adverted to another passerby and she scurried away, hoping to receive income from them as well.

Teddy quickly regained his bearings as he eyed Victorie's window once, smiling at her shadowy figure, which shyly lurked in the recesses of her room.

As he stared at her, he returned her song with one of his own. "_I feel you, Victorie, I feel you. I was half convinced I'd waken, satisfied enough to dream you. Happily I was mistaken, Victorie! I'll steal you, Victorie, I'll steal you..._" The figure disappeared, and he nodded to himself, satisfied. He meant every word he said. He would steal her away from her imprisonment with the Minister. Teddy was rather talented with a wand. This Minister didn't know what was coming. This Minister… was standing outside of his door, waving a gloved hand at him, beckoning to him. A broad smile spread across the stubble adorned on his face. "Come in, lad!" he said, waving his hand more vigorously, "come in!"

Teddy stepped, almost warily towards the door, but the Minister's smile was too welcoming, too warm to completely turn down. So he followed the man's hand towards the house. And he followed it down the hall, to the right, into a large library. "Sit down, lad, it's alright."

A fire popped and cracked somewhere behind him, and the Minister leafed through a book, propping himself on a table across from Teddy. Not looking up from his book, he asked, "I saw you from my window. You look quite lost. Is there a place I could help you to go?"

Teddy fumbled with his words as the Minister thrust a glass of fire whiskey into hand. "H-Hyde Park, sir. It's rather large on the map, but I keep getting lost. It's quite embarrassing for me, a sailor, to lose his bearings, but, well, there you are," Teddy added with a shrug, sipping the alcohol in search for an excuse to silence himself.

The minister looked up. "A sailor, you say?"

Teddy nodded. "Yes, sir. _The Bountiful _out of Plymouth. I realize it's not… typical that a wizard earn his living as a sailor, but I just love the way the sea smells, and the way the wind feels as it-" but the Minister was not listening and Teddy's words fell on deaf ears.

The Minister nodded to a companion, a man, who appeared in the doorway, turned his attention back to Teddy. "A sailor must know the ways of the world, yes? ... Must be practiced in the ways of the world ... Would you say you are practiced, boy?"

Teddy knitted his eyebrows together in confusion. "Excuse me, sir?" he asked, setting the whiskey down on a table shakily.

The Minister moved his hand lovingly along the leather bindings of the shelved books. "Oh, yes ... such practices ... the geishas of Japan ... the concubines of Siam... the catamites of Greece ... the harlots of India ... I have them all here ... Drawings of them."

Teddy's eyebrows knitted closer together still with confusion.

"... All the vile things you've done with your whores," The Minister continued, coming closer to Teddy with a book ready. "Would you like to see?"

Teddy stood quickly. "There must be some mistake!"

"I think not." The Minister's voice was dripping in poison, and just as fast as Teddy stood, he was forced back down into the seat, confined by the Minister's strong arms. "You gandered at my ward, Victorie. You _gandered_ at her. Yes, sir, you gandered."

The Minister's companion moved somewhere behind Teddy, closer to the chair he was sitting in than Teddy would've liked. He could feel his hands on the back, and smell his stench emanating from every orifice the man had.

"I meant no harm," Teddy said, earnestly, trying not to breathe in or lose eye contact with The Minister.

"Your meaning is immaterial. Mark me: if I see your face again on this street, you'll rue the day your bitch of a mother gave you birth."

Teddy's jaw went slack, but no sound stumbled forth.

"My Victorie isn't one of your bloody cock-chafers! My Victorie is not to be gandered at!" And with that, the Minister snapped his fingers at his companion, and Teddy's shoulders were bruised with his grip as he was dragged outside into the damp, biting air. The man pulled out a rod and gave Teddy several whacks with it before kicking him over on his back. "Hyde Park is that way. A left, a right, and then straight on, you see?" With several more whacks to Teddy's quivering body, the man put his heavy foot on his chest. "You heard Minister Malfoy, little man." He pressed his billyclub hard into Teddy's skull, and with a silver hand, grinded and twisted until Teddy cried in pain., fearing his head would spill into a gelatinous puddle on the cold ground. "Next time it'll be your pretty brains all over the pavement."

And with that, the man swung his rod over his shoulder, limped proudly back into the mansion, and slammed the door behind him.

Teddy pulled himself up, gripping the stone wall for support. He glanced at Victorie's window with a moan of agony._ "I'll steal you, Victorie. I'll steal you! Do they think that walls can hide you? Even now I'm at your window. I am in the dark beside you, buried sweetly in your yellow hair." _As he walked along the street, he stopped and turned, taking one last, longing look at Victorie's window, gripping his side in pain, and wiping the crimson, metallic liquid from his lips. _"I feel you, Victorie, and one day I'll steal you. Till I'm with you then, I'm with you there, sweetly buried in your yellow hair..."_ He could feel it, the love and the bravery building up within him like a reversed hour glass, determination welling and threatening to spill over.

Slowly, he turned and limped his way to Hyde Park.


End file.
